Hello and greetings, friends and Hivers. how about an Evening Groove tonight? Well, it's morning in Japan at the moment, but it will be evening for most of you, so this works well. Seems like I used to do these nightly, but I haven't done one in at least a few months. So it goes. So let's change that and revisit this old series and add a new entry.

Swords & Sworcery

I've covered many of the major genres of music in past entries, but this will be a new one. Not only is Swords & Sworcery a soundtrack, but it is a game soundtrack! But what a soundtrack!

The game itself is one of my favorites. These days I don't play many games, to be honest, but this one hit me at the right time. It was released several years ago when the iPad was still a relatively new thing and when I had just bought one. I happened to catch a trailer for the game on some mac website I read at the time and was impressed enough to buy it. I think it was maybe 5 bucks at the time. I was hooked from the moment I started.

^Believe

^{The Triforce!!—er, I mean the Trigon Trifecta}

^{The hero speaks about herself in the first person plural, or the royal we. Weird, but you get used to it}

The game story is a fairly simple. So and so goes on a quest to release and then free a spirit—for what reason we are never told beyond "we are heroes". Pretty simple, but it is dressed within Jungian theory, much 4th wall breaking, many nods to classic nintendo games (such as Zelda), and amazing music, and this combination makes for a really wonderful experience. Totally recommended. I reinstall the game and play through about once a year. It's short and simple, but is a hell of a ride, like a good movie.

The Music

Oh yes, the music. This happens to be one of the best soundtracks I have ever heard. I love it!

Here you go, the original soundtrack, all of it. I suggest you play it in the background while you go do other things. It's really wonderful.

If you want to get a good idea of how the gameplay and music blend together, check out this video which shows one of the battles in the game. I suggest headphones and turn it up.

Enjoy! (and go play the game. iPad version recommended, but it is on Steam and plays pretty well on PC too. It was even ported to the Switch a year or two ago.)

❦

David LaSpina is an American photographer and translator lost in Japan, trying to capture the beauty of this country one photo at a time and searching for the perfect haiku.

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